I was spoiled because I happened to catch the tag end of the CBS Evening News. Grrr.

Since I am currently in the contestant pool, I am glad James is gone. I am also glad he didn't surpass Ken's regular-play winnings. Nothing against James, but I simply prefer Ken. I thought he was funnier.

Was spoiled, came to watch anyway because maybe the spoiler was a lie. That was a fun game to watch!

I WTF'd the wagering initially too, but after doing a bit of reading and running the numbers, James did what he had to do to give himself the best chance of survival. (I'm honestly more confused by Jay's bet.) I've been in James's shoes in FJ!. Those are the worst shoes.

And yes, I've already heard babbling about how he threw the game. My eyes just rolled boxcars.

I've been there as well. The game is on the leader's racket, and there's nothing you can do about it. People keep telling me I lost because I didn't bet enough. I've given up explaining that my only chance was if Gilbert got FJ wrong. (He didn't. So it goes.) Betting more wouldn't have helped if the leader got it right. You bet so that there is only one variable: If the leader gets it right, he wins; if he gets it wrong, you do.

BTW, am I the only one who thought that both rounds tonight were on the easy side? That minimized James' knowledge advantage, making an upset more likely.

Emma is the most impressive giant slayer since Victoria Groce. (This was a very different game from the error-ridden Madden-Kaltenbaugh-Groce one, but the common theme is the challenger being in the driver's seat, rather than the champion losing through errors.) Hopefully she can overcome the curse and maybe we'll see a rematch in the TOC.

I am really glad the challenger who defeated James turned out to be another well-prepared contestant, who has strong fundamentals and also understands how the game should be played.

A minor gripe: Emma should have wagered more on that last DD. How much more? Hard to tell. She cannot realistically expect a lock, even with a TDD, so very large wagers are not optimal, but if James had regained his buzzer mojo, her score would not have been enough to sustain the lead. I would stick to my rule of thumb that, unless there's a calculable reason, it's never worth wagering an amount between $5 and $5,000.

Finally, my unpopular bur correct opinion: leaks and spoilers about results (NOT about clues) are a valuable public service. Especially for a show like J! that has a lot of viewers who don't like surprises and prefer to have time to adjust to changes.

Well... thanks to all the posters who thought their hints were so subtle that they didn't count as spoilers, I strongly suspected this was the day. I didn't get that impression from Facebook or Twitter or Reddit or the bleedin' New York Times. I avoided all that. But I can't avoid you guys without, you know, avoiding you guys. Next time try keeping your mouths COMPLETELY shut, ok?

Still, amazing to watch. I agonized over Emma's cautious bet on DD3 after her baller all-in on DD2. But she hung onto the lead and we got to that moment where I paused the game, counted up the remaining dollars, and realized that (barring some negs on Emma's part) James was going into FJ in second place. Alex described that situation as, "Closest it's been in a while." Try "This has never happened before," or "Closest it's been since before James was on the show."

So we'd been saying that the way James would go down was against a strong player and a weak player so the two competitors weren't dividing the remaining spoils. But it turns out he went down against TWO strong competitors. I think we have to credit Jay with an assist here. He kept the ball away from James and allowed Emma to stay ahead.

Loved the Get Well card made by James's daughter. Wish they shown a closeup of it. I was going to post a screenshot and a crop of the card, but I see Mark Barrett has done that for us.

Also loved James proving to be a mensch in defeat.

I don't want to jinx it, but Emma seems a stronger player than Nancy Zerg. This is less of a fluke than Ken's miss on H & R Block. As Bamaman said, "Ken lost to Nancy. Emma beat James." Emma won even though James got FJ right. That's amazing.

not really that big of a deal....if you didn't read anymore than that, you still don't know how dude gets bounced and also don't know the clues of the entire game....i am actually excited to watch knowing that he will no longer be coming into my house on a nightly basis

Tell us how you really feel.

No. Please don't. And everyone else, please don't respond to this poorly socialized person--especially not to posts like the above. I have him killfiled and don't have to see his incivility unless it gets quoted.

When Jane Pauley interviewed Alex for "CBS Sunday Morning" for a segment that aired May 12, she asked him: "When you recorded the 'Jeopardy!' segments featuring James, was that before you had your diagnosis?" His reply: "Some of it was before, and some of it was after."

My head jerked up and my wife and I looked at each other with big eyes. I said, "He loses before the end of the season." It was only a matter of time. The spoilers were there if we were looking for them.

This is a very sad for me, I had sincerely hoped he would make it over 100 games. The only real consolation is that he lost in the best possible way, and to a really good contestant. My hope is that she goes on to play in his aggressive style and win scores of games, and maybe top $150k a few times. The idea that we could return to a time of doing categories top-to-bottom, wagering even numbers, wagering small numbers, and having accuracy below 90% is one that saddens me.

Anyways, I get that in theory, he made the right wager, and also in practice it was the right wager, but I have a question for the vikings: could a wager of $11,399 (to stay above Jay's DJ score) or even $7,799 (to stay above Jay's score if he wagers at most $4,600 which is the right move for him) be justified? I just hate the thought of allowing the leader to win with a $0 wager when I could have stopped it (I would hate to find myself between 2/3 and 3/4 of the leaders total), I respect James for having the balls to hold himself to $1,399; I don't know if I could do it.

Well... thanks to all the posters who thought their hints were so subtle that they didn't count as spoilers, I strongly suspected this was the day. I didn't get that impression from Facebook or Twitter or Reddit or the bleedin' New York Times. I avoided all that. But I can't avoid you guys without, you know, avoiding you guys. Next time try keeping your mouths COMPLETELY shut, ok?

Still, amazing to watch. I agonized over Emma's cautious bet on DD3 after her baller all-in on DD2. But she hung onto the lead and we got to that moment where I paused the game, counted up the remaining dollars, and realized that (barring some negs on Emma's part) James was going into FJ in second place. Alex described that situation as, "Closest it's been in a while." Try "This has never happened before," or "Closest it's been since before James was on the show."

So we'd been saying that the way James would go down was against a strong player and a weak player so the two competitors weren't dividing the remaining spoils. But it turns out he went down against TWO strong competitors. I think we have to credit Jay with an assist here. He kept the ball away from James and allowed Emma to stay ahead.

Loved the Get Well card made by James's daughter. Wish they shown a closeup of it. I was going to post a screenshot and a crop of the card, but I see Mark Barrett has done that for us.

Also loved James proving to be a mensch in defeat.

I don't want to jinx it, but Emma seems a stronger player than Nancy Zerg. This is less of a fluke than Ken's miss on H & R Block. As Bamaman said, "Ken lost to Nancy. Emma beat James." Emma won even though James got FJ right. That's amazing.

you know you could have stayed out of the thread and would not have known beforehand, if you were able to avoid other platforms and their spoilers

not really that big of a deal....if you didn't read anymore than that, you still don't know how dude gets bounced and also don't know the clues of the entire game....i am actually excited to watch knowing that pos will no longer be coming into my house on a nightly basis

Tell us how you really feel.

No. Please don't. And everyone else, please don't respond to this poorly socialized person--especially not to posts like the above. I have him killfiled and don't have to see his incivility unless it gets quoted.

you used a word that is only found in urban dictionary? kind of impressive

Has anyone figured out what James said to Jay during the Final reveals?

Any lip readers want to give it a shot?

Here's a GIF:

And again at half speed:

I don't think it was addressed to Jay. It looks like he's saying "Emma..." but the rest kind of mumbles together. Maybe "Emma, you got this" or "Emma, you're right." (CAVEAT: I am not a lip reader, just figured to speculate.)

Anyways, I get that in theory, he made the right wager, and also in practice it was the right wager, but I have a question for the vikings: could a wager of $11,399 (to stay above Jay's DJ score) or even $7,799 (to stay above Jay's score if he wagers at most $4,600 which is the right move for him) be justified? I just hate the thought of allowing the leader to win with a $0 wager when I could have stopped it (I would hate to find myself between 2/3 and 3/4 of the leaders total), I respect James for having the balls to hold himself to $1,399; I don't know if I could do it.

My first thought was no way could it be justified. But then again, with his 97% get rate on FJ combined with the fact that third should (in theory, but few contestants understand this) not wager everything, it probably should be at least considered. Another reason would be this, James will always wager optimally, which means Emma can wager $0 and win regardless.

I hate second level thinking on Jeopardy because contestants are typically so sub-optimal when it comes to wagering. It is just useless. But in this case.....

This is why the best poker players always balance their ranges, if you always bet in the same manner, even if it's optimal, you can be exploited. James could have easily been exploited in FJ.